Tag Archives: Folk

Mark Erelli: Milltowns

MarkErelli_MilltownsA deeply felt tribute to New England singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey

When a song is recorded, its performance is frozen at a point in time that instantly begins to age. But when a song is passed along, it is reborn every time it is performed anew. The same can be said for songwriters: when their lives end, their performances pass into record and memory, but their songs continue to be renewed in the performances of others. And so it is with New England singer-songwriter Bill Morrissey, whose passing in 2011 closed the book on his life as a performer, but whose songs remains alive in the voices of others.

Mark Erelli is one of those voices, and as a disciple of Morrissey, he’s reflected the teacher’s craft in his own work. To repay the debt, Erelli’s recorded an album of Morrissey covers, capped by an original composition that reflects on the bookends of their relationship: the first time they met and the last time they performed together. It’s a bittersweet close to an album of covers that is itself a bittersweet catalog of longing, missed opportunities, farewells, happenstance, wanderlust and resolution that’s sometimes happy, sometimes resigned.

Morrissey’s songs are filled with details that could probably be traced to specific inspirations. He intertwines people, places and things, employing emotions, actions and even geographic details as the seeds of his observations. He steps inside his characters as they observe themselves and others, and distills these thoughts into lyrics whose truth seems to have been latent, waiting to be exposed. His characters struggle with the harsh realities of the Northeast’s declining milltowns, banal jobs, dashed dreams and harrowing reflections of their own mortality.

As drawn by Erelli’s selections from Morrissey’s catalog, love is a restless siren whose call is as likely to be heard departing as it was arriving. But there are bursts of hope, such as the optimism that pours out of “Morrissey Falls in Love at First Sight” and the expectations of “Long Gone.” There’s also humor, albeit of a gallows variety, as “Letter From Heaven” imagines a hereafter where one’s heroes have shucked off their Earthly foibles. Perhaps Erelli imagines that this vision of heaven welcomed the songwriter himself, as the closing elegy “Milltowns” laments the songwriter’s struggle with alcohol.

Erelli’s talent as a musician is magnified by his taste as a producer. Performed and produced in large part by himself in his basement studio, the guitars, dobro, mandolin, harmonica, bass and drums all appear naturally in place, with nothing missing and nothing extra. Even the overdubs of his guest musicians and vocalists sound as if they were added extemporaneously. It’s a mark of his instrumental and studio prowess that the layering sounds so organic, showing absolutely no trace of construction.

The fealty to Morrissey and the craft of his songwriting add up to something much more than a covers album; it’s a personal tribute from someone who knew, worked with and learned directly from the subject. Morrissey’s songs were passed to Erelli in much deeper form than a recording or sheet music, or even a performance; Morrissey’s legitimization of the Northeast as a place from which gritty, honest folk music could spring was a legacy that launched Erelli’s career, and something for which Erelli is obviously deeply grateful. These performances remind us that a songwriter’s songs make an indelible mark on the world as their DNA is passed in an intergenerational chain. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Mark Erelli’s Home Page
Bill Morrissey’s Songbook

Peter Himmelman: The Boat That Carries Us

PeterHimmelman_TheBoatThatCarriesUsSoulful singer-songwriter sees light ahead

Singer-songwriter Peter Himmelman’s been banging away for nearly forty years now, creating an impressive catalog of personal and observational songs touched by rock, blues and soul. He’s recorded for a major label, achieved success on college and alternative rock radio, toured, podcasted, entertained children, gained placements in (and composed soundtracks for) television programs, and has been nominated for both an Emmy and a Grammy. He’s also developed an innovation and leadership consultancy. But as documented on the 2007 DVD Rock God, even with regular doses of critical recognition, Himmelman grew disillusioned with the gap between his artistic accomplishments and his commercial rewards.

Luckily for his fans, soul searching is rich grist for the artistic mill, and self-reflection has led Himmelman past the darkness explored on his last few releases. The album’s opening track poses hope against struggle as a boat willfully charts its own path against strong currents, and Himmelman’s protagonists do similarly as they navigate rocky roads and recalibrate their courses to circumvent troubles ahead. Himmelman’s realized that fearing to lose is its own loss and that successfully confronting life’s tribulations often results in a happier standing; he even circles back on his own pessimism on “For Wednesday at 7pm (I Apologize).”

Written mostly in transit, the songs often build travel into metaphors of personal transformation. The inventory of “33K Feet” is nominally that of a plane’s cabin, but its enumeration inspires introspection, and on the ground, the lines drawn between physical and metaphysical roads are often found to be narrow. Himmelman’s pick-up band features an all-star rhythm section of Lee Sklar (bass) and Jim Keltner (drums), and together with guitarist David Steele, the quartet tracked a dozen songs in just a few days of on-the-spot arranging and live recording. Keyboardist Will Gramling dubbed touches of organ afterwards, but they mesh so well with the core productions that you’d never know they weren’t added live.

Himmelman’s singing favors the rye tone of Randy Newman, the soulfulness of Willy DeVille, and, particularly on “Afraid to Lose,” the hope and ambition of Neil Diamond. Still, his lyrical voice remains singular, particularly as he emerges from years of critical analysis into a world where adversity is an invitation rather than an insurmountable challenge. His band adds to the warmth with Southern-tinged rock and soul whose conversational tone belies the group’s quick introduction and short schedule. Those who helped fund this project through Kickstarter have certainly gotten their money’s worth, and those who are just finding out now are in for a treat. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Peter Himmelman’s Home Page

Ronnie Fauss: Built to Break

RonnieFauss_BuiltToBreakLate-blooming Americana singer-songwriter brings punk-rock brio

Singer-songwriter Ronnie Fauss seemed to materialize from the ether with his 2012 label debut, I Am the Man You Know I’m Not. And though his public career as a musician started late, he’d been self-releasing EPs alongside a life that included both profession and parenthood. Like many late blooming artists, Fauss came to his craft with something more to express than the intense, but often callow emotions of youth. As a Texan and label mate of John Hiatt and Steve Earle, Fauss’ characters and stories are informed by the state’s songwriting heritage, but his music mixes a healthy dose of rock ‘n’ roll with its twang. He takes it down to acoustic guitars and fiddle for several tracks, but electric guitar, bass and drums form much of the album’s core, suggesting the Long Ryders, David Lindley and others who straddled the divide.

Fauss’ singing may remind you of Social Distortion’s Mike Ness, with a similar punk-rock brio fronting the wear of every day living. Fauss’ protagonists are long on enumerating their shortcomings, though often short-changed on remediation. The down-tempo “The Big Catch” offers a bleak picture of dysfunctional parenting echoing from one generation to the next, and “Never Gonna Last,” sung as a duet with Jenna Paulette, turns on the hook, “I ain’t never been more lonely / than the time I spent hanging around you.” His characters race one another to be the first out the door, leaving them oddly disappointed when they lose. The Old 97’s Rhett Miller guests on the trucking-themed “Eighteen Wheels,” supplemented by Chris Tuttle’s rousing piano, and a cover of Phosphorescent’s “Song for Zula” repatriates its opening nod to “Ring of Fire.”

Those with holiday depression may want to steer clear of “I’m Sorry Baby (That’s Just the Way it Goes),” in which Fauss relates an aging mother’s lonely Christmas. Whether the song is arch or callous is unclear, but it’s effective. There’s a note of remorse in “I Can’t Make You Happy,” but the tone is more fatigued surrender than prolonged sorrow. The closing “Come on Down” is a poignant lament whose siren’s call and working-class strength are underlined by Devin Malone’s sorrowful steel guitar. The song provides a thoughtful ending to an album that reflects on the realities of adulthood and their roots in (and on-going repercussions to) childhood trajectories. Those who enjoyed Jonny Two Bags recent Salvation Town will find a kindred musical spirit in Ronnie Fauss, and those who haven’t heard either should start right here. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Ronnie Fauss’ Home Page

Matt Harlan: Raven Hotel

MattHarlan_RavenHotelTexas singer-songwriter is a poet and storyteller

Matt Harlan is a singer-songwriter whose original folk tunes are leavened with country twang and dusted with Texas soul. He’s tramped the blue highways of the U.S. and Europe (and written this album’s “Raven Hotel” about the ravages of touring), played intimate stages, house concerts and festivals, was lauded as last year’s Texas Music Award singer-songwriter of the year, and was featured alongside Guy Clark and Lyle Lovett in the documentary For the Sake of the Song. After a sophomore effort recorded with a Danish backing band, he’s returned to Texas to lay down a dozen new originals with help from Bukka Allen, Mickey Raphael and other area luminaries.

Harlan’s both a storyteller and a poet, illustrating his stories with memorable similes, and realizing his images with narrative detail. His lyrics of hard times take on the weary tone of Chris Knight, but unlike Knight’s often unrelenting bleakness, Harlan’s troubles are redeemed by dreams of forgiveness and the possibility of progress. The wounds of “We Never Met” are addressed with a fatalism that points forward, and the haggard trucker’s regrets in the superbly drawn “Second Gear” are grounded in hard-worn pride. Social commentary and glances towards the exit are juxtaposed in “Rock & Roll,” with an electric backing and matter-of-fact vocal that echoes Dire Straits.

Harlan turns to jazz with “Burgandy and Blue,” and to blues with “Slow Moving Train”; the latter features Mickey Raphael’s unmistakable harmonica and a duet vocal from Harlan’s wife, Rachel Jones. Jones brings a delicate, whisper-edged lead vocal to the free-spirited “Riding with the Wind.” The album closes with its most overt declarations of hope and dreams in “The Optimist” and “Rearview Display,” though as is Harlan’s way, his protagonists are clear-eyed as they contemplate the burdens of both limitations and freedom. This is a deeply written collection, sung with a storyteller’s magnetism and a poet’s magic. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Matt Harlan’s Home Page

NRBQ: Brass Tacks

NRBQ_BrassTacksTerry Adams’ latter-day NRBQ keeps chugging along

The discussion no doubt rages on, as to whether founding member Terry Adams’ reconstituted lineup should be using the NRBQ name. Even Adams wasn’t so sure back in 1989. But with the band’s long-time lineup starting to fray in 1994, and an official hiatus ten years later, a number of interrelated projects took the group members in various directions. Adams, who turned out to have been dealing with throat cancer, returned to full-time music-making with the Terry Adams Rock & Roll Quartet in 2007, and four years later, with the rest of NRBQ still dispersed in other bands and projects, reapplied the NRBQ name to his quartet for the album Keep This Love Goin’.

Is it NRBQ? Many of the original band’s fans would probably say ‘no,’ but Adams, guitarist Scott Ligon, drummer Conrad Choucroun and bassist Casey McDonough, certainly carry on the NRBQ ethos of musical taste, deep knowledge and an irreverent sense of adventure. You need a pack full of hyphens to describe their mosaic of R&B, jazz, sunshine pop, country, folk and rockabilly, and their topics range from sweet (“Can’t Wait to Kiss You”) to loopy (“Greetings from Delaware”) to fantastical (“This Flat Tire”), and their music even stretches to a cover of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s “Getting to Know You” that’s more California sunshine than old Siam. Call them what you will, just make sure to call their music really good. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

NRBQ’s Home Page

Tom Freund: Two Moons

TomFreund_TwoMoonsFormer Silos bassist extends his catalog as a singer-songwriter

Tom Freund is a songwriter who’s something of a musical chameleon. His latest release opens with “Angel Eyes,” a tune whose sharp edged lyric, “funny how when you leave L.A. you gotta drive into the desert / out of the frying pan and into the fire,” is worthy of Randy Newman. Freund’s lap steel further echoes Los Angeles with its David-Lindley-esque tone, and his guitar complements Al Gamble’s organ on “Heavy Balloon” with atmospheric notes and a meaty solo that builds the track to its close. The latter is a fitting background to a lyric that graduates from ambivalence to skepticism to possibility to hope.

Such sophisticated, and often contrasting, shades of emotion are central to Freund’s songwriting. “Happy Days Lunch Box,” ostensibly a nostalgic tribute to childhood, is freighted with adult hindsight, and the anti-love song “Next Time Around” paradoxically embraces the missing embrace of a partner and wraps it in a 20s-styled tune. The album’s bittersweet closer “Sweetie Pie” is an appreciation of a love that’s ended, sung to acoustic guitar and bass. Freund has a nasally voice that suggests Dylan, songwriter Moon Martin, and on the riff-driven “Grooves Out of My Heart,” Joe Walsh, with a nod to Led Zeppelin in the fadeout for good measure.

Freund phrases like Paul Simon on “Same Old Shit Different Day,” and his plea for acceptance “Let Me Be Who I Wanna Be” provides the same sort of rallying flag as Sonny Bono’s “Laugh at Me,” but with a tone that’s satisfied rather than reactionary. In addition to the deft songwriting and wide-ranging musical palette, Freund’s production includes well-placed touches of strings, horns, ukulele and vintage keyboards, guest harmonica from Stan Behrens, and backing vocals from Ben Harper, Brett Dennen and Serena Ryder. Freund’s imagination as a songwriter is matched by his reach as an arranger and producer, making this collection both varied and cohesive. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Tom Freund’s Home Page

The Howlin’ Brothers: Trouble

HowlinBrothers_TroubleNostalgic bluegrass, folk and blues with a shot of modern vitality

The Howlin’ Brothers continue to combine a formidable collection of Americana sounds, including country, folk, blues, bluegrass, gospel and Dixieland, with the moxie of street performance. Their latest works even harder to stop passerby in their tracks with banjo country, harmonica-and-slide blues, weeping fiddle tunes, steel-guitar waltzes, Cajun dance numbers and vocals that invite the audience to sing along. Their playing exhibits the best of two worlds, combining the energy of extemporaneous expression with the finesse of experience. It’s as if they captured the essence of a Saturday night stage and an impromptu Tuesday-afternoon street corner in a studio recording. The track list also plays to the feel of a live set, with carefree numbers, rough plaints and sad tales taking listeners on a roller coaster of emotions. One can easily imagine this entire disc played on stage as-is, returning dancers from the whirl of “Monroe” to shed a few dizzy tears to the heartbroken “World Spinning Round.” The trio’s range is impressive, including upbeat bluegrass, spare folk and steel honky-tonk in a truly coherent mix; it’s like listening to a day of Strictly Hardly Bluegrass in one band; even the reggae “Love” somehow fits easily into their set. Most impressively, the group instills new energy into classic roots forms, keeping this from turning into a nostalgia fest or even an exercise in progressive twists; it’s just inspiring and fun. A lot of fun. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

The Howlin’ Brothers Home Page

The Everly Brothers: Songs Our Daddy Taught Us

EverlyBrothers_SongsOurDaddyTaughtUs2014 expanded reissue of the Everlys’ deepest roots

The Everly Brothers second full-length album is extraordinary in many different ways. In addition to its basic triumph as roots music, its exposition of traditional folk and country songs was a nervy artistic statement by a duo that was helping build the foundations of rock ‘n’ roll. A string of hit singles written by Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, including “Bye Bye Love,” “Wake Up Little Susie,” “All I Have to Do is Dream,” “Bird Dog” and “Problems,” had made the Everlys international stars, and after an eponymous album that also included tunes from Little Richard, Ray Charles and Don Everly, a simply arranged and tenderly sung collection of songs learned from the Everlys’ father was far from the obvious follow-up.

A decade later the pair would record Roots, another album of country standards, but in a country-rock vein that was of its time. In 1958, amid the explosion of rock ‘n’ roll, the acoustic guitar, stand-up bass and harmony duets of Songs Our Daddy Taught Us, reached back to both the material and performance style that were the Everly’s actual roots. These are the songs that Ike Everly sang with his sons on their 1940s radio show, and the boys’ affection for the material is evident in the gentle harmonies they lay upon lyrics of deep sentiment and surprisingly dark themes.

Varese’s reissue adds alternate first- and second-takes of four of the album’s titles and an eight-page booklet of photos and liner notes by Andrew Sandoval. The alternates range from slightly imperfect performances of the same arrangements used on the masters to an electric-guitar backed idea for “Down in the Willow Garden” that didn’t make the original album. It’s a mark of the Everlys’ deep background as live performers that the alternates are basically good enough to have passed as masters. Snippets of studio dialog and strumming give a feel for the dynamic between the Everlys and producer Archie Blyer, the latter of whom seems to have mostly let the brothers roll.

Songs Our Daddy Taught Us didn’t sell in large numbers at the time of its issue, but neither did its artistic detour interrupt the brothers’ string of hit singles for Cadence. The album’s been reissued many times, including a 1962 retitling as Folk Songs of the Everly Brothers that landed in the middle of the folk revival. Late last year the album was reissued with a second disc of earlier and original recordings, and the album’s track list was re-recorded by Billie Joe Armstrong and Norah Jones as Foreverly. The on-going attention received by the album further demonstrates the brothers’ artistic prescience and the project’s continued resonance. Varese’s expanded reissue is a great introduction and a worthy upgrade. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

The Everly Brothers’ Home Page

Fearing & White: Tea and Confidences

FearingAndWhite_TeaAndConfidencesStriking collaboration between Irish and Canadian singer-songwriters

Singer-songwriters Stephen Fearing and Andy White have released numerous albums under their own names and in groups (notably Blackie and the Rodeo, and ALT), but this turns out to be only their second as a pair. Now living on opposite sides of the globe (Fearing in Halifax, White in Melbourne), the album was written in a two intense face-to-face sessions and recorded six months later with Gary Craig on drums. The material ranges from strummed folk songs to mid-tempo pop and to surprisingly heavy guitar rock, with moments that recall the Warren Zevon, Eric Clapton and Rockpile.

The duo’s songs are rife with accumulated wisdom and the craft that comes from practice. Their experience as performers is evident in the multiple ways their music supports their words. The strummed guitars and confident vocal of “Secret of a Long-Lasting Love” remain buoyant as the lyric’s loneliness and desire lead to reunion and consummation. A sense of optimism sees failed relationships as pauses rather than endings, and lost souls find paths back home. The funky shuffle “We Came Together” opens with riffs that suggest both T. Rex and the Everly Brothers, and the growling electric rhythm riff provides bedrock for “Sanctuary.”

The album’s ballads suggest the bittersweetness of Nick Lowe’s solo material. “Another Time Another Place” (which seems to give an unconscious nod to Bob Seger’s “We’ve Got Tonight” with its opening vocal hook) meditates on missed opportunities, “Think of Me Like Summer” and “Save Yourself” are pained in their separations but generous with their wishes, and the heartache of leaving in mirrored by the possibility of a new start in the “Emigrant Song.” Fearing and White are each sophisticated troubadours in their own write, but there’s extra magic in their collaboration. [©2014 Hyperbolium]

Fearing and White’s Home Page

Hypercast #3: Americana

A collection of recently released country, Americana, rock and folk, plus a few reissues. Click the artist names below for associated album reviews.

The O’s “Outlaw”
The Coals “Dirt Road”
James Booker “If You’re Lonely (Alternate Take)”
Owen Temple “Johnson Grass”
Tim O’Brien & Darrell Scott with John Prine “Paradise”
The Everly Brothers “Long Time Gone”
Jimbo Mathus & The Tri-State Coalition “Shine Like a Diamond”
Jonny Two Bags “The Way it Goes”
Moot Davis “Use to Call it Love”
Steve Poltz “Song for Hawk”
David Frizzell & Shelly West” “You’re the Reason God Made Oklahoma”
Sid Selvidge “Wild About My Lovin'”
Fearing & White “Secret of a Long-Lasting Love”
Marah “The Falling of the Pine”
James Booker “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby”
Terry Waldo “I’m Just Wild About Harry”
Holly Golightly and the Brokeoffs “Trouble in Mind”
Old 97s & Waylon Jennings “Iron Road”
John Anderson “These Cotton Patch Blues”